BYOD is here to stay.

Do you work smarter on your own tablet, smartphone or laptop? Go for it, says corporate IT.

BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) is safely past the flash-in-the pan stage: recent research has found that by 2017 half of the world’s employers may impose a mandatory BYOD policy requiring employees to bring their own laptops, tablets or smartphones to work and that over 70% of mobile professionals will conduct their work on personal smart devices by 2018.

Forrester® completed a survey of 5,102 businesses and found that workers are plunking down $1,253 annually on computers to do their jobs. Let’s face it, the BYOD phenomenon is hitting the mainstream—and drawing the watchful eyes of IT managers everywhere.

IT’S ABOUT TOOLS (NOT TEXTING)

At its outset, BYOD spawned fears of Angry Birds™, Facebook® and texting killing productivity, but as the trend matures, it turns out that workers are using their devices to augment their skills, not waste away work hours. As Forrester analyst David Johnson points out, “When the tools a person depends on for their job belong to them … they will buy tools that align best with their own strengths and help them do the best work they can.”

FINE-TUNING WORK-LIFE BALANCE

BYOD means ease of use for workers and more productivity for companies that implement a well-run BYOD plan. Armed with her own iPad®, a worker might read personal email, check Twitter®, update her Outlook® calendar and sit in on a video call—all while waiting to pick up her child from school.

BYOD has big benefits for business too. Less time offline for workers means projects move forward more quickly and critical business decisions aren’t restricted to the 9-to-5 world. And while organizations and employees have yet to work out all the BYOD kinks, those extra tablets, smartphones and personal computers you see your coworkers toting around look like they’re here to stay.

LIFE OF THE BYOD PARTY

At home on almost any device, Lifesize Cloud leads the pack for video conferencing in the brave new BYOD world.

• Available on PCs, Macs and the latest Android and iOS devices
• Reach out to anyone in your contact list through video, voice or text at the click of a button
• Add new participants to your Lifesize calls by simply clicking on a name
• Join group video meetings from any standards-based room video system, laptop or mobile device, or via Microsoft® Lync® clients

LEARN MORE

For more information, your free trial or to request your personal demonstration, visit us at: www.lifesize.com/cloud

SOURCES:

http://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/2466615
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/btl/bringyour-own-device-movement-by-the-numbers/79506